Trivia NYC/DSO Media

Yes, I’m recapping America’s Most Smartest Model. It’s keeps me off the streets, homey.

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You know, it bothers me that in the opening credits of the show, the only actual sound sample from the show itself that they use (there’s a lot of “I think, therefore I…” type crap added in later) is the phrase “umbrella tree,” which came from Angela in the first episode when she had to name as many different trees as she could. Ben claimed it wasn’t a tree, when it actually was, and so instead of making the models sound dumb, it’s actually the one sample they could use that makes the models sound smarter than Ben Stein. Which, now that I type it out and look at it, might have been the point. Well, anyway.

Morning has broken, like the first morning. For some reason, Andre has been moved from his palatial Fortress Of The Vanquished into a smaller room with Lisa and Aussie Rachael, who are busy doing their makeup while he lounges and kvetches. “There’s more competitions to go, and I’m planning on being the last man standing,” he says, which tells me maybe he thinks a woman is going to win this thing. Funny. I have Aussie Rachael and Brett as my final two. Maybe we should start a pool. (If you have a guess, though, leave it in the comments.)

I’m eating as I watch this, so my digestive system is deeply grateful for the fact that Torso Rachel and VJ are at least sleeping together with their clothes on. Rachel is oblivious to the fact that she’s being used by the openly mercenary VJ, which makes her ooeygooey pronouncements maybe just-this-much sadder. “We wake up, and I’m cuddling with VJ again, and I love cuddling with him because he’s extremely hot, and it’s always a nice way to wake up in the morning.” On the other hand, it’s very possible that she has truly mastered the art of living completely in the moment, to the point where every day is a new adventure.

Torso Rachel may have achieved the highest form of enlightenment. She might be Buddha with bolt-on boobs. I only know that I do not know what I do not know.

The note du jour arrives, saving me (and you, and you’re welcome) from further Socratic and epistemological introspection. It comes with an anatomy book, so Angela, who has a degree in Animal Sciences, gets reading honors. Her hair is straightened this morning, which looks odd with the cuts between the morning shots and the camera parts, which were clearly added some other time. She doesn’t have an afro, but her hair is awful curly, and it looks great. Straightening it does her no favors. She reads:

Today’s Edge Challenge is all about anatomy. But not the kind that VJ and Rachel have been studying late at night…

Mary Alice interjects to the camera: “Todays’ Edge Challenge revolves around anatomy, and I’m not going to tell you what this is, but I am not going to be anywhere near that room when it happens.”

…By the way, you all should learn this anatomy book inside and out, because one of you is going to be cut tomorrow night. Mary Alice.”

Lisa, who at this point is definitely one of the bottom feeders, frets: “Last night, Mary Alice tells me that I need to really work on my smarts. I could be the next to go. So now, I gotta step up in the smarts and the modeling. Period.” She knows only that she does not know. (I can’t wait for the episode where they have to use Schopenhauer’s rules of discussion to find a consensus on the essence of various moral and ethical issues! ROFL!)

Now, given that VJ has taken and hidden study materials before, it truly baffles me how everyone in the house managed to let him do it again. Yes, from on the kitchen table, in front of everyone, he just took the book and hid it on everyone. How did everyone in the house just let him walk off with it again?

I didn’t think it was possible, but these people, as a group, may be even stupider than I thought.

Andre, who by rights should have a knee in VJ’s chest between this and what happened the night before in the Judgement Room, is instead looking at the various anatomical models that have been left about the house. There’s a cutaway of a pregnant woman, a brain, a skeleton, a 3-D blowup of the human ear… I wonder if this stuff was always there or they snuck in and placed these things overnight, like Santa Claus was moonlighting at a medical supply outlet. (A handy hint: you can never have enough plaster wrap cloth handy. Never.) Andre is marveling at the fetus model. “There’s this male fetus, he’s not even born yet, and this woman’s suffocating him! Like, it remind me of my ex-relationship! Like, poor baby! They do this before we’re born! Give the guy some space! Och!” He pulls the fetus out of the womb. “You’re free now, brother.”

I can’t add anything to that. That’s perfect, Andre. You Clearly Understand Women.

The rest of the models thumb through the encyclopedia and dictionary looking for whatever clues they can find. Angela, the science major, seems a little overconfident all of a sudden. “Going into this challenge, I think I’m gonna know what I’m doing. I love science. I am really good at science. And the rest of them had better watch out, because I’m gonna blow them out of the water.”

Pickel bristles: “Angela. The know-it-all. Seriously, put a sock in it, Angela. I’m over it.” Brett: “If the name of this show was America’s Most Annoying Model, I think Angela would take it home.” He’s obviously forgetting about Ivan Drago, and the kleptomaniac, and his creepy stroke-victim child bride, and the mouthy know-it-all, and the moovie star, and the Professor and Mary Ann.

Torso Rachel gives an impassioned speech about how she’s going to try and be smart from now on, except it looks like there are three different people offscreen with joysticks operating her right eye, her left eye and her jaw. If this show was actually popular, there would be whole pages on geocities of creepy animated gifs of her speaking.

From there, they all pile into the two AMSM short buses and head to Birmingham High School. Aussie Rachael, who, despite being quite sensible and my personal favorite to win it all, is definitely not a science major, starts to get nervous about this. Ben Stein and a Mr. Morrison, an advanced biology teacher, are in the science lab waiting for them with some items under a sheet. Ben orates: “As Mr. Morrison or any high school teacher will tell you, knowledge of the human anatomy is extremely important, and the best way to learn that is through dissection. So, models, this is today’s Edge Challenge!”

The sheet is whipped aside, Iron Chef-style. Today’s secret ingredient is… Piglets!

Everyone squeals in horror. (Get it? Squeals? I’m so good at this.) Aussie Rachael: “I’m ready to be sick. This is not the way I like my pork.”

Ben: “Like tenth grade high school students all over America, today, you’re going to dissect fetal pigs.” I remember my first time. We did rabbits, and it was 11th Grade, but I went to high school in Canada, so YMMV. Anyway, the fact that he’s right doesn’t make this segment any less gross if you’ve never done this before, or if you cheated off a friend to get your science mark, as a certain long-torsoed Candidate For Expulsion admitted to last week. “There’s no fucking way I’m doing this,” she says, on cue.

You know, in literally every science class I took that had a dissection project, there were always a couple of people who categorically refused to do it, either on ethical grounds or general squeamishness. And yes, it is gross. But those people, if they stuck to their guns, didn’t get a passing mark in anatomy. They were either failed or the rest of their mark was prorated. If either of those applies here, then Torso Rachel will sleep with the fishes tonight. Instead of with the weasel.

* * *

Mr. Morrison, the biology teacher, starts his speech: “These are fetal pigs that have never been alive…” Torso Rachel cuts in immediately: “I had a potbellied pig, and that’s what it looked like when she was a baby.” (To the camera: “My pig’s name was Chelsea, and when I looked at these little baby pigs, all I could think of was little baby Chelseas.”) “This is like so against my religion. And I’m a vegetarian.”

Morrison makes up a nice story, clearly well-rehearsed after years of teaching this class: “They have never breathed, they have never felt. What happened was, the mother developed some sort of disease, and instead of sending the babies through the pain of birthing them, they were given a cesarean section, and they were pulled out ahead of time, not alive. So you will not be working on something that can feel, taste, nothing. No memories whatsoever.”

Daniel: “I feel extremely strong about anatomy. I was a biological anthropology and anatomy major, so I thought it would be fun to dissect a pig.” Oh, Daniel, shut up.

Ben: “You’re going to have 30 minutes to extract the following vital organs from your fetal pig: heart, liver, lungs, intestines, tongue, stomach, kidneys, gall bladder and testicles… the person or people who correctly identify the most body parts will win the edge for tomorrow’s Callback Challenge, which will be a 30-second commercial in the shower. Not only will the person be given the script at the end of this challenge, but he or she will be the only person who gets to shoot the scene with warm water.”

As skeeved out as Torso Rachel is by cutting her little dead Chelsea open, she apparently is more scared of cold water, where she apparently doesn’t function well. (It does beg the question, doesn’t it?)

Everyone comes up one by one to grab a pig. Angela, the one with an actual Science degree, goes first, strutting down the center aisle, grabbing the top one like it’s a handbag, and strutting back like she’s working a catwalk even now. She was invisible for the first two episodes. Now it seems she’s being picked out a bit more often. Interesting.

The cutting begins. Lots of handheld footage of the models jabbing and hacking away, making various ew-faces. Daniel’s tied his hair up in a topknot, not because it’s too long, but because, actually I don’t know why. Maybe he’s fantasizing about sumo wrestlers or something.

The two Rachels are the most grossed out. Aussie Rachael is working through it, but Torso Rachel keeps having to take breaks. Mr. Morrison is there to help her through it. “Turn around. Breathe,” he says, clearly concerned that he’s going to have to clean up some model-puke, which let’s face it is way grosser than mere corpse-runnings.

Torso Rachel has another moment of satori: “I kept saying to myself, this pig’s spirit and soul is not there anymore. It’s just the body. We all leave our bodies behind, and so do pigs.” That’s right, baby, our bodies are merely a vessel in which our consciousnesses make their cosmic journey across the deserts of existence. Now get that bikini on and go make that box of Wheat-Thins look good!

Everyone seems to have found the liver and heart and lungs okay, but the testicles are a bit harder to find. They’re not in the hangy-outy place like they are on people, and so Lisa, Brett, Pickel and Andre all seem puzzled. The ticking clock of The Mystery Of The Missing Testicles gets louder in the background until finally, time’s up.

Mr. Morrison goes from table to table marking everyone’s accuracy, presentation and cleanliness, and then Ben pimps him: “Jim, why don’t you tell us how they did.”

Wait. The teacher’s name is Jim Morrison? Way to soft-pedal that one, guys! I mean, won’t you tell me your name?

So, Jim Morrison goes through everyone’s plate, and docks various people for various things. Aussie Rachael got a B, mistaking the bladder for a testicle. VJ got an A for presentation (he apparently worked in a butcher shop for a while). Andre mistook the pancreas for a testicle, and missed the gall bladder completely (”If I wanted to be a rocket scientist, I would have stayed in school,” he says, although I seem to have missed where the rocket science part of this episode was). He got a C.

Torso Rachel, shockingly, got an A-. She’s ecstatic. (”I am so happy, because I did well in the smarts department!”) Brett got an A-. Lisa got a B, which she’s happy about as well, especially considering she got the only pig that was actually female. Pickel had an exploded stomach, but aside from that he was perfect. An A for him.

And again, the brain part of the competition comes back down to Daniel and Angela, who the Lizard King saved for last. They both did perfect, except Angela got docked for having a lung that was cut in an odd place. So Daniel got an A+ and won the Fetal Pig Dissection. He’ll have all the warm water he needs in order to talk and talk and talk. And talk.

And talk.

While Ben goes off to wake the van drivers so they can all head back to the house, Angela goes and pokes around Lisa’s pig to see what the difference is between a female pig and a male pig. No malice, she’s just genuinely interested, and — uh oh! — she finds little Glenda is really a Glen. She puts everything down as quietly as possible, but Andre, in his newfound role as Self-Appointed Defender Of All That Is Right, somehow detected the one extra fetal pig’s worth of testosterone in the room, and decided to make a big deal out of it. “Her pig had testicles after all! It’s not fair!” He commoted, to everyone in the room, to which Pickel said, quite rightly, “So what?” He’s right. It wasn’t like Lisa won the challenge, or even remotely has a chance of winning the competition.

I’m assuming Andre’s making a big deal of it because he got the worst mark in the room, and he needs to have at least one other person get a C in order to preserve his worldview. Daniel starts to argue with him about it, but Lisa actually grabs Daniel: “It’s okay. All he wants is another fight. Let him be.”

Of course, Andre gets very angry at Lisa for implying that he just wants to get angry at someone. Rage issues suck. You can’t say anything to anyone without them getting all that’s-all-you-ever-do back at you. But Andre’s feeling some heat. To the camera: “I demand justice! I’m not going to be on the chopping block tonight!” Hate me one time, I could not speak, but hate me two times, last me all through the week.

Cut back to Lisa, in the standard hands-up conflict avoidance maneuver she uses whenever she’s around Andre (and which she’s had the most experience with out of everyone; she does wind up around him more than most of the models) saying, “Don’t yell at me, honey! I’m not the one who made the mistake!”

Andre suddenly discovers a fresh vein of patriotism: “It’s called fairness! It’s called America!”

To which Lisa holds up two fingers, and yells “Suck my dick, asshole!”

…aaaaaand, scene!

* * *

Torso Rachel, looking more aware of her surroundings than she’s been in days: “Nooo, Lisa! Don’t say that! That’s a privilege!”

Daniel: “Andre, regardless, it’s not gonna affect you!”

Andre: “Angela, if it wasn’t for you, I’d still to this day think that was a fucking chick!”

Angela: “No, no, the only reason I said something was because I thought I just got it wrong!”

So Andre gets Jim Morrison to come back and look at Lisa’s pig, and Angela is apologizing to everyone in the room for being nosy, and Morrison says, under his breath, “I wish I could call you a liar, but you’re not… I screwed up. I’m only human, so…”

Andre crows to the camera: “Great job, Angela, because you just got me out of the gutter! Thank you!”

Morrison downgrades Lisa’s mark to a C, and she’s pissed: “My grade gets taken away from me. Why am I suffering? I’m not even the winner!”

The American Poet watches them bicker for a minute or two more, and as his brain matter starts to visibly shoot out his ears, he takes a couple of deep breaths, and says to everyone, “Yo! I get more respect out of my kids at times! Hopefully this settles it. Go home! Get some sleep! You,” he turns to Daniel, “study your lines! Have a wonderful evening!”

And with that, everyone piles back in the short buses to head back to the ranch.

In the weight room, Brett is working the stairmaster while Daniel reads over the script, confirming it’s 30 seconds. “So after the edge challenge I thought it was really important for me to practice my script and get the lines down cold. That was difficult because there were a lot of lines… I didn’t feel confident at all.”

Andre is in the shower, toughening himself up with the cold water. They used to be tougher than this in the Gulag, comrade. No showers! Just Polar Bear taking a piss on your bare back during season of endless night! Then back in the uranium mines for greater glory of motherland! Good Russian stock like you should have no problem with this piddly LA bourgeois stream of nothingness! You will sell Soviet Moisturizing Body Wash to dogs who deserve nothing except the fall of capitalism as we know it! So-vyuuuuut!

There is no adequate segue from there to Solar Studios, Stage One. Everyone gets out of the short buses in only a crisp white robe (which I’m assuming makes them easier to track in case any of them decide to make a run for it).

Mary Alice is there with two very creepy-looking henchmen who I’m assuming are the ones running the commercial. “This is our client, Matt Heinze” (wait, this is an actual product with an actual person? I’m assuming they’re going to shoot a real one for him, with an actual actor, after today, unless he owed her a favor from some other time; it’s clear that this whole series would stop cold if Mary Alice didn’t have a ton of chits to call in from all her friends) “…and here to direct the commercial is Zosimo Maximo,” which she says as if this was a different director whose name rhymed with “Fartin Smorcese.” (Given my name, I’m not one to mock others’ names, but if your name is Zosimo Maximo, there are a finite number of professions you can realistically enter, and most of them involve television or porn. So I’m glad it’s worked out for him.)

Matt is the actual judge: “I’m going to look for, in your gestures, in your expressions and in your performance, if you can show me just how amazing Lather Products are.” Nowhere in the run-down is there a promise that the winner would actually get to shoot a real ad. I mean, Brett’s going to Hawaii to shoot an aerobics video with the mighty Gilad. This week’s winner gets … wet. Hm.

One more twist: each model gets to do as many takes as they can do in ten minutes, but the decision as to which take is the one they’ll be judged on is going to be made by another model. (That’s better. This seemed alarmingly straightforward. The challenges should all have this kind of twist from here on in.) Everyone has to pick now. VJ stares bullets at Torso Rachel, who stares right back. Brett & Pickel lock arms, Angela sees a way to atone for the pig-crime to Lisa, Daniel & Aussie Rachael frantically nod at each other, and since there are an odd number of models, Andre is left out.

Mary Alice asks, sarcasm dripping, “Andre, it’s come to that? There’s not one person you can trust in this lineup of models?”

Andre shrugs. “I don’t trust anyone. It’s a competition.” (To camera: “Great. So now I have to pick a script supervisor out of this pack of wolves.”) Finally, when pressed, he decides on Pickel, figuring he’s got the highest probability of being fair. That may be true, but we’ll see how that works out.

Daniel goes first. He got the script the day before, and he hasn’t completely memorized it (learning lines is not a natural skill for everyone, even someone as smart and hyperverbal as Daniel), but he & Aussie Rachael work it out. While Daniel runs the script under his breath, VJ stands about 5 feet behind him, so obviously trying to listen in that it’s a wonder someone doesn’t throw a shoe at him to chase him off. Finally, they notice him and move to the corner, and VJ follows them, hiding behind a mirror with a finger in his ear, continuing to listen in, his face a world of devious serenity.

Problem is, VJ’s in full view of everyone else in the place. Pickel and Brett are sitting and relaxing on a couch, staring at him trying to hide in plain sight, openly marveling at how bad he is at actual espionage. Brett gets angrier and angrier watching him: “He’s listening to the lines! This, this guy! ” Finally, he shouts out loud, “Dude! We don’t like cheating!” which finally shoos him off into a corner, where he gnaws on a lamp cord and pisses behind a chair.

Angela can’t understand why he feels he has to cheat: “It’s like nothing! I mean, seriously, he doesn’t think he can get four lines in 20 minutes? Really?” It makes me wonder if Angela has actually spoken with him. VJ is clearly someone who has grown accustomed to needing all the help he can get.

* * *

Brett is still angry after the break. He goes over to VJ, who reacts badly to being confronted. “Wipe your fucking cock and get your panties out of a bunch and shut your fucking hole in your face. Step it up, boys, step it up. Step up your game. Get on my level.” (Is that the script? Is that the whole script, VJ? That’s what you’re memorizing? That’s what you stole? That’s awesome! What a good thief you are! You’re a spy in the house of love! You know the dream that we’re dreamin’ of!) The shot pans back, and we see that VJ is getting all huffy while sitting on the back of a chair, while Andre is sitting in the chair. VJ was literally sitting on Andre’s head while giving that speech, and everyone else was looking at the two of them and smirking.

VJ makes exaggerated baby noises to the camera. He has certainly embraced his heel turn, hasn’t he.

Daniel & Aussie Rachael meet Zosimo Maximo first, and Daniel’s warm-water run leads off. He flubs the lines a few times, but he seems to do a fairly decent job at getting through it. Rachael picks Take 5, whichever one that was, and then she goes. (”I really feel I have to prove myself at this Callback Challenge. because I’ve let it be known that I do commercial work, you know, I have a reputation to defend now.”) She does a great job of flirting with me the camera, and manages to get through her lines without her lungs seizing up, which I suspect is some kind of victory.

A montage of the rest of the models follows. Pickel tries to do as much talking outside the ice-stream as possible, Andre & Angela both literally go into gasping spasms in mid-sentence, Lisa runs screaming from the shower, and Brett screams like a white lady in church when the water comes on.

(It occurs to me: if Jesse had made it this far, he’d have rocked this round. He’s an actual actor, and that extra layer of fat would have helped him stave off the ravages of the icy water. I miss you already, you big lug.)

They run Torso Rachel’s three best takes in their entirety. When she says, “It keeps my perfect model body… even perfecter!”, VJ, listening outside, bursts into uncontrollable laughter. (Rachel, to the camera: “I think my brain just froze,” followed by a full ten-second pause. I can’t stand her, but I gotta say, she gives such excellent stupid that whenever she leaves the show, it’ll be poorer without her.)

Andre can barely even start the script, the water is so cold, but he talks a good game to the camera: “This shower is far colder than I imagined. But every cell in my body is Russian. Cold water is no threat to me! I’m Soviet!”

Pickel makes a good point: “The name of the product is Lather’s Yuzu-Bergamot Body Wash. Now, this is just a recipe for disaster. I see it already.” Another montage of people getting the name of the product wrong. That’s kind of a big deal. I mean, the name sucks, and it’s gotta be hard to say in a stream of icy water, but the fine people at Lather are paying for this episode. The models owe it to these jokers to try and get it right.

Later, after everyone’s warmed up, they file into the viewing room, where Mary Alice, Matt & Zosimo are waiting with clipboards. They start running the takes as chosen by the other competitors.

Daniel goes first. He had hot water and an advance copy of the script, but he’s not really an actor. He does better than I figured he would, but if we’re looking for someone to have “nailed it,” it wasn’t him. They show only short clips of everyone else’s; Rachael and Andre ultimately did alright, VJ’s boobs looked massive with the camera angle, and Torso Rachel kept forgetting to look in the camera.

It seemed like everyone picked the best takes of the other people in good faith. Pickel didn’t sabotage Andre like he could have, and Rachel is VJ’s only ally, so in your dead pools, wherever you have Rachel going, you can pencil in VJ for the next day.

Daniel got a B, Rachael got an A, there’s a smattering of B’s and C’s, and then Matt turns to Rachel, who Mary Alice described as “a bit of a disaster”: “It not only looked like you didn’t like the product, it looked like you didn’t like water. So I’m afraid that’s probably not something we’d be able to use.” She gets the first failing grade of the competition, but at least she made it through the process and didn’t give up.

VJ’s cheating and extra preparation paid off. They gave him an A, to a round of seething looks from the other models. Andre, Defender of the Weak: “Mary Alice needs to know that VJ’s been cheating, because it is a competition, and because it’s about fairness.” Good heavens, he’s turning into the Soviet Al Sharpton! He rats to the feds, again: “The whole house would like for me to address something to you. VJ absorbing most of the script.” (VJ: “They’re all fucking scared that I’m too much of a competitor, and that I’m going to take them all out. One, by, one, like a goddamned sniper. Bam, bam, bam, every one of them.”)

Mary Alice rolls her eyes: “I actually am completely blown away by you guys right now. You think that that is sneaky? VJ didn’t cheat. He was paying attention to what was going on around him.”

It’s true, there weren’t any rules to break. Was it ethical? No. But what were they expecting by tattling to mommy? Daniel, expressing the naiveté of a generation: “This is like a really bad after school special where you’ve twisted the morality.” Matt thankfully interjects on Daniel’s little wussfest to explain that this is often what it’s like in the real world. People are strange when you’re a stranger. Faces are ugly when you’re alone.

(Sorry. I put the Doors on during the Jim Morrison pig fetus scene, and … yeah. I’ll turn it off now.)

Regardless, Matt gives VJ the win, and immunity. VJ gloats hard to the camera. Chalk one up for Big Daddy, you whiny punks. I’m paraphrasing.

They all get back on the short bus, and Torso Rachel cries on VJ’s shoulder. This is quite possibly their last night together. Maybe she’ll let him put it in her pooper.

* * *

Judgement Room time. Catwalk walk, music of foreboding. Lisa and Torso Rachel are convinced they’re going home. VJ: “I’m starting to believe that I’m the only person in this house that understands the definition of competition. I’m bringing my A game. So if you’re not bringing it, then don’t even show up.”

It’s true, he’s all about the competition, but I can’t help but think: The modeling world isn’t infinitely big, and a hundred grand isn’t a lot in the grand scheme of things. Wouldn’t it be better to make friends with the other models and the people involved, so that later on, after this show is lost to the mists of history (so, ten minutes after the last episode ends, deo volente), the modeling career you’re building can flourish with the connections you’ve made? Wouldn’t that be smarter, y’know, taking the long view?

Nah, fuck ‘em.

Mary Alice gets coy with her speech this time out: “Tonight we’re going to do something different. We’re going to only call two of you down. I think you know who I’d like to step down, so please, the two of you, please come down.”

A brief pause, and then Lisa and Torso Rachel move in unison down the walk. Ben: “Extra-sensory perception,” he says, grimly.

Mary Alice: “Why do you think you stand before us? You want to start, Lisa?”

“I stand before you because I’m not up to par like the rest of the models behind me, intellect, smarts, I know that I lack in that. God gave me other things that I feel very confident about, and that’s why I stand before you.”

Rachel: “I think I’m here not only because I’m beautiful on the outside, but I’m really beautiful on the inside too.” (”So right now I’m flipping out, I’m so nervous, I am not ready to go home.”)

Mary Alice explains the dilemma. Rachel got an A- on the pig dissection, while Lisa got a C. But Lisa got a B on the shower challenge, and Rachel got an F. So to solve the dilemma, they’re going to have what Mary Alice is calling a Smart-Off.

Ben reacts with mock horror. “My God! A Smart-Off! That’s too cruel!” Lisa and Rachel look at each other, alarmed and bewildered.

* * *

Brett: “A Smart-Off between Lisa & Rachel. This is gonna be a lot of fun to watch.”

Turns out it’s a straight-up trivia test, first to come up with the answer blurts it out. The other models stand behind them, clearly uncomfortable at watching a potentially mockingly cruel contest that could run all night.

Ben: “In what country is Darfur located?”
Rachel: “Oh, I’ve heard about Darfur. I knew there was a problem there. Arabia?”
Lisa: “Yeah, all I could picture for that is a men’s cologne.” (Brett: “Yeah, I’m sure that smells nice.”)

Ben: “Who wrote the famous American Novel, Tom Sawyer?”
Rachel: “… Tom Sawyer?” (At this, Mary Alice doubles over in laughter.)

Ben: “If you are betting on a 3-1 bet, and you win, how much do you win?”
Lisa: “If you’re betting five dollars? Five dollars.”
Rachel: “15 dollars?” (Ding!)
Ben: “Yes, of course. Tell me, in what century was the American Civil War?”
Rachel: “The nine…teenth century?”
Ben: “Yes! She got that! She got that!”

There’s a wider shot at this point, where we can see Mary Alice looking on in horror. Clearly, she (and, to be fair, I) was convinced that Torso Rachel was dead meat in this, but Lisa has yet to get a question correct, and like a stopped clock, Rachel seems to be right twice a day.

Ben: “I think frankly, Rachel is way ahead in the Smart-Off, but I’d like to give you a chance to go a few more rounds in the Smart-Off and see if Lisa can pull herself together… Who did George Bush run against for President in 2004?”
Rachel: “Oh my gosh…”
Lisa: “Oh my gosh… in 2004? Um, … Dole. Is that right?”
Rachel: “John… Kerry?”

Lisa, to the camera: “Being smart to me isn’t memorizing information that is often not used. Facts and definitions, I don’t really want to engage myself in.” (What? Deny the Tyranny of Facts? Well, then, Lisa, regardless of how you do in the last six minutes of this episode, you are Dead To This Trivia Blog.)

Mary Alice (verbatim): “You know, to be a successful model takes a lot of smarts. The girls that get to the very top, is, um, for a reason, whether they’re book smart or street smart, they’re smart.”
Lisa: “I know, and I know I’m smart, I have… amazing street smarts, I really do.”
Ben, with the dagger: “Do you? What’s Mary Alice’s last name?”

As Lisa twitches wordlessly, the other seven models across the back of the room all wince and bow their heads at once. It’s the dying moment of one last freshly-killed corpse.

* * *

They rewind to Ben asking the question again. “What’s Mary Alice’s last name?”
Lisa twists and clenches for a full five seconds. “… … …Alice?”
Mary Alice bursts into laughter. “Okay, that’s it,” she gasps, as Ben loses his composure as well.

Eventually, they come back to their spots, and Ben tries explaining what just happened to her: “Do you think you’re smart enough to know that possibly you don’t belong here? Lisa, we have to say this, we’re sad to say this, but… like the Articles of Confederation after the ratification of the Constitution, you are now historical arcana. Goodbye and good luck.”

Lisa hugs Rachel, and walks past Angela, who mouths I’m sorry through her tears. Actually, quite a few people are crying. Don’t you love her as she’s walking out the door.

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